※ The artwork in the lobby has been de-installed as scheduled after November 14, 2021.
The exterior wall installation and AR work can be viewed only.
The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea (MMCA) presents its commission project MMCA Cheongju 2020, Kwon Minho: Clouded Breath. MMCA Cheongju, which opened in December 2018, curates the MMCA Cheongju Project 2020 allowing the production of experimental works in an expansive outdoor space, supporting emerging and established Korean artists.
For this project, Kwon has produced Clouded Breath, in which he takes architectural drawings of MMCA Cheongju, a former tobacco factory, and fills them with stories of the factory. Referencing materials dating from the opening of the factory, in 1946, to its closure in 2004, Kwon adds his own imagination to create compressed symbols of tobacco processing machines and cigarette names symbolizing the factory, and key events and symbols of Korea's industrialization in the 1960s and 70s, when the factory reached its heyday.
The tobacco factory in Clouded Breath recalls three works. In addition to the silk screen and video installation in the lobby, one work is installed in full size on the outer wall of the museum, creating a sense of realism. The most exceptional feature of this exhibition is Kwon's introduction of augmented reality (AR)-based content. Viewers downloading the MMCA X ARound app and pointing their mobile devices at the museum wall will discover Kwon's flat works in 3D. It is our hope that viewers synaesthetically experiencing Clouded Breath, expanded from architectural drawings to building walls and augmented reality, will recall and reflect upon the tobacco factory that has now disappeared into history.
